Hundreds of thousands of health workers have staged a strike in protest at the Government's decision not to give them a 1% pay rise.
Midwives, nurses, paramedics, ambulance staff, and hospital porters and cleaners mounted picket lines across England from 7am for four hours, while action will be taken later today in Northern Ireland.
It was the biggest strike of its kind for over 30 years involving 400,000 NHS staff and several trade unions, including the Royal College of Midwives (RCM) for the first time in the organisation's 133-year history.
Contingency plans were worked out, and union members dealt with emergencies. NHS bosses postponed non-emergency appointments during the strike but emergencies would not be ignored.
Ambulance service providers had warned they may be forced to prioritise their care and brought in extra staff from the military to fill in the gaps.
Unions were protesting at the Government's decision not to accept the independent pay review body's recommendation to award a 1% pay rise to all staff.
Instead, ministers took the decision to award a 1% pay rise for those on top of their pay band but not to those on "progression pay increase", who automatically get a fixed average pay increase of 3%.
The unions say the number of NHS England health workers who will not benefit from the additional 1% is around 600,000.
Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt defended the Government's stance: "Everyone is going to get the 1% but what we have said is we can't afford to give the 1% to the people who are already getting an increase of 3% through their increment.
" …The reason is very simple: we have analysis that shows if we did that hospitals would lay off around 4,000 nurses next year and 10,000 nurses the year after and that would be bad for nurses and of course very bad for patients," he said.
Unions said there had been "tremendous" support for the strike across the country and that it was the right thing to do.
TUC general secretary Frances O'Grady, who joined a picket line near Euston in London, said: "NHS staff are always reluctant strikers - there hasn't been a national strike over pay in the health service since 1982 - and they will do everything they can to protect patients in their care. But morale has hit rock-bottom."
Unison general secretary Dave Prentis told Sky News that despite ministers "glorying" that Britain was now out of recession his members were "getting nothing".
"They are being screwed and screwed and screwed again while the rich in our society make a killing from the growth in the economy," he added.
As they marched, midwives shouted: "Don't push midwives - push fair pay."
They said they never imagined having to go on strike but were at their wits' end.
Annie Black, who has been a midwife for 12 years, said: "We haven't had a pay rise for years yet our workload keeps on increasing. It's time the Government took us seriously. It's weird being on strike, but we feel that enough is enough."
Cathy Warwick, chief executive of the RCM, added: "Midwives are caring people who often work long hours of unpaid overtime just to keep our understaffed, under-resourced maternity services running in the midst of a decade-long baby boom.
"They deserve this modest 1% pay rise."
The average annual private sector pay increase is currently around 2.5%, while last year it was recommended that MPs should see their pay increase by 11% by 2015.
Anda sedang membaca artikel tentang
Midwives Among 400,000 Striking Health Workers
Dengan url
http://serverkecil.blogspot.com/2014/10/midwives-among-400000-striking-health.html
Anda boleh menyebar luaskannya atau mengcopy paste-nya
Midwives Among 400,000 Striking Health Workers
namun jangan lupa untuk meletakkan link
Midwives Among 400,000 Striking Health Workers
sebagai sumbernya
0 komentar:
Posting Komentar